About the Author

Phillip Burnham

Articles by Phillip Burnham

WASHINGTON -- Twelve years after the U.N. Assembly declared the Decade of
Indigenous Peoples, the Native population of Latin America still barely
gets by, said a recent report by World Bank economists.
The picture they present is bleak. Rates of Native poverty in the region
have barely budged over the last decade. earnings...

WASHINGTON -- Fifty-eight thousand names are carved in black granite on the
Vietnam Veterans Memorial, a tribute to sacrifices in a faraway war. Only a
mile away, the list of those fallen in a struggle closer to home is still
growing.
Chiseled onto a pair of marble walls flanking Judiciary Square, the 17,000...

WASHINGTON -- Hearing a phrase of Tohono O'odham in Washington is like
catching sight of a rare and beautiful bird. It's a language of hushed,
lilting sounds, perfect for making songs about rain and corn or writing
poems about desert clouds.
That's how Ofelia Zepeda, linguist and writer, began a public talk the
National...

WASHINGTON -- Virginia Driving Hawk Sneve has long known something most
people never learn: the world has been created, and destroyed, many times
over.
Sneve, a storyteller by profession, was at the Smithsonian's National
Museum of the American Indian this month to discuss her new book, "Bad
River Boys: A Meeting of the Lakota with...

STURGIS, S.D. - Dewey Beard was the last survivor of the Battle of the
Little Big Horn; a warrior, rancher, actor and respected elder. His
eventful life, which spanned a century, is still remembered by friends and
family.
Corliss Besselievre can never forget the day she and her husband were given
Beard's regalia.
It the...

OGLALA, S.D. -- Dewey Beard was the last survivor of the Battle of the
Little Big Horn: a warrior, rancher, actor and respected elder. His
eventful life, which spanned a century, is still remembered by friends and
family.
The more Leonard Little Finger read the letter, the less it made sense. His
grandfather, had...

PINE RIDGE, S.D. -- If you've seen the movie, you know Little Big Man was a
doozy of a tall tale. No one this side of Hollywood could have hunted
buffalo as a boy, hobnobbed with white men, fought Gen. George Armstrong
Custer, taken Jesus as a savior, survived an Army or...

WASHINGTON -- In Hollywood, movies are supposed to be about Indians, not by
them. And give them some feathers and buckskin if they want to act.
Sonny Skyhawk has spent the better part of a lifetime trying to change all
that.
Skyhawk is executive producer of "The World of American Indian Dance," the
first production...

WASHINGTON -- After a long history of bloodshed and forced removals, the
U.S. military has been giving something back to Indian country.
Since the Cold War ended, the government has closed 97 major military bases
at a savings of $29 billion to the American taxpayer. Tribes from the
Muckleshoot to the St. Regis are...

WASHINGTON - The legal team for the Washington Redskins has been forced to
punt.
The latest decision on Harjo et al. v. Pro Football Inc., handed down by
the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia July 15, was a
qualified victory for plaintiffs in a saga that has wended way...